Frank Gaffney of Family Security Matters has written this important piece on Dick Morris look-a-like Elena Kagan on her views regarding sharia law. Hopefully the confirmation hearings will pay close attention to this matter and ask Ms Kagan to explain herself, her views on sharia law, and especially how she sees sharia in connection with gay rights.
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June 23, 2010
Was Solicitor General Subtly Soliciting Shariah Law?
Frank Gaffney, Jr.
Hats off to Senator Jeff Sessions! The top Republican on the Senate's Judiciary Committee has opened up an important new front in the debate over Solicitor General Elena Kagan's fitness to serve on the Supreme Court: Her attitude towards the repressive legal code authoritative Islam calls Shariah and her enabling of efforts to insinuate it into this country.
By so doing, the Alabama legislator has given his colleagues and the country an opportunity not only to flesh out and evaluate the thin public record of President Obama's second nominee to a lifetime appointment on the nation's highest court. The Senator has also afforded us all what Mr. Obama might call a "teachable moment."
Specifically, this Supreme Court nomination offers a prism for examining the concerted and ominous campaign underway to bring Shariah to America, thanks to the troubling role Ms. Kagan played during her tenure as dean of Harvard's Law School. In a speech on the Senate floor on June 16th, Sen. Sessions reflected on that role in noting a seemingly astonishing inconsistency in the nominee's much-touted support of homosexual rights:
. . . Information has come to light suggesting that Ms. Kagan may...have been less morally principled in her approach than has been portrayed. Around the same time that Dean Kagan was campaigning to exclude military recruiters - citing what she saw as the evils of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell” - Harvard University accepted $20 million from a member of the Saudi Royal family to establish a center for ''Islamic Studies'' and Shariah law.
An Obama State Department report concerning Saudi Arabia and the Shariah law concept noted: ‘Under Shariah, as interpreted in [Saudi Arabia], sexual activity between two persons of the same gender is punishable by death or flogging.'
Ms. Kagan was perfectly willing to obstruct the military, which has liberated countless Muslims from the hate and tyranny of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban, but it seems she was willing to sit on the sidelines as Harvard created a center funded by - and dedicated to - foreign leaders presiding over a legal system that would violate what would appear to be her position.
Some of Kagan's defenders have sought to excuse her failure to oppose the promotion on campus of a brutally homophobic agenda by claiming that the program funded by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is actually on another part of Harvard's campus, not that of the law school. For example, the George Soros-funded attack website, Media Matters, claimed: "Harvard University, not Harvard Law School - where Kagan served as dean - accepted the Saudi prince's [2005] gift."
Senator Sessions did not say Elena Kagan accepted the check. Rather, he pointed out that her selective opposition to mistreatment of gays suggests that something other than principle was operating. If Ms. Kagan had no trouble with people who advocate the murder of homosexuals having offices anywhere at her university, it would appear her determination to deny access to its campus to military recruiters bespeaks nothing more than hostility towards the armed services. Is that something we really want in a Supreme Court justice?
Worse yet, Dean Kagan had an even more direct connection to the Saudis' Shariah-recruitment efforts at Harvard. She personally officiated in 2003 over the establishment of an "Islamic Finance Project" at the law school itself. The Project's purpose is to promote what is better known as "Shariah-Compliant Finance" (SCF) by enlisting in its service some of the nation's most promising law students.
Consequently, it is absolutely appropriate for Senators to explore Elena Kagan's attitude towards Shariah - an anti-constitutional, supremacist legal doctrine that is not only a threat to homosexuals, but to our civil liberties and society more generally.
Shariah-Compliant Finance dates back to the 1940s, when it was invented by leading figures in the Muslim Brotherhood. This international organization has as its stated mission "destroying Western civilization from within...by its own miserable hand." SCF is designed to further these seditious purposes by: legitimating Shariah in non-Muslim societies; compelling non-Shariah adherent Muslims to use SCF, rather than conventional financial products (in particular, arrangements that involve charging or paying interest); and diverting funds through techniques known as "zakat" (tithing) and "purification" to support jihad. In fact, one of the driving forces behind the SCF industry, Qatari Sheikh Yusef al-Qaradawi has actually called SCF-generated zakat "jihad with money."
Ms. Kagan's Islamic Finance Project has also played a prominent role in encouraging the U.S. government to endorse Shariah-Compliant Finance. Notably, a founding advisor to the Project, Harvard professor Samuel Hays III, conducted a "seminar for the policy community" in November 2008. It was sponsored by a former Goldman Sachs executive-turned-Assistant Treasury Secretary, Neel Kashkari, who at the time was responsible for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). The signal thus sent could not have been clearer, either to Kashkari's colleagues in government or those in the financial sector: At a moment when the very viability of major banks and investing institutions critically depended on this individual's favor, it would be advisable to embrace Shariah-Compliant Finance.
Thank heavens Jeff Sessions will play a leading role in the Judiciary Committee's scrutiny of Elena Kagan. Since there is so little else to go on concerning her judgment and judicial philosophy, her attitude toward and association with Shariah's insinuation into this country loom large. We can only hope that Sen. Sessions and his colleagues will make the most of this teachable moment. At the very least, her association with Shariah adds to the already long list of issues on which a Justice Kagan would have to recuse herself, seriously diminishing her value to the court.
FamilySecurityMatters.orgContributor Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy, a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the syndicated program, Secure Freedom Radio, heard in Washington weeknights at 9:00 p.m. on WTNT 570 AM.
This is mostly a red herring, but any American university accepting funding from the Saudi royal family should be closely questioned as to what strings, if any, are attached. Any large donor has influence, of course, but if the money is transferred, for the general purpose of establishing a center of Islamic studies, with the personnel and policies under the control of the university administration and normal hiring standards, no harm done. Study of Islam is a legitimate subject.
ReplyDeleteIF the circumstances of the grant establish a center for propagating Wahabbi teachings, of course it should be refused.
Shariah-compliant financing is not, per se, a problem. Islam, like Christianity, and Judaism, condemns usury. Modern capitalism is build on usery. The Pope found some rationale to abandon the prohibition, Christians who didn't want to dirty their souls with usery told Jews this is the only trade we will let you practice, Muslims have often found that an economy without usery is unsustainable. Trying to find a way to invest capital without usery while benefiting from the resulting revenue is creative, not very stable, but not morally wrong.
Further, it is no more a crime for a Muslim to practice Shariah, privately, than it is for a Jew to keep Kosher. To the extent that practicing Shariah means infringing the rights of a fellow citizen, Shariah must yield. Fellow citizen, in America, includes a man's wife and to some extent even his daughters, although that wasn't true in the 19th century.
Of course graft is graft, whether it is committed by Bernie Madoff or the Muslim Brotherhood. A lot of "you hate my religion" subterfuge would be stripped away from genuine crime, by not making the religion an issue -- simply focus on the crime.
The Middle East Studies departments in universities tend to be dominated by Israel bashers who are one-sided in their teaching.
ReplyDeleteSharia law- You know the old adage about the camel's nose in the tent. Our constitution and principls of equality and equal protection under the law cannot be negotiated. Or should not be.
Why should an American Muslim girl be left to live under shariah law which may allow an "honor killing'. What about an American apostate? Under shariah, the penalty is death. What about gays? When it comes to our precious laws, no compromise. It sounds harsh, but if some Muslims in America want to live under shariah law, their choice is clear.
Gary, what part of "To the extent that practicing Shariah means infringing the rights of a fellow citizen, Shariah must yield," did you not understand? Of course honor killing cannot be permitted, any more than human sacrifice is permitted. Your right to practice the code of your faith ends where another person's life and body begin, including your wife and daughter. Period.
ReplyDeleteNow if two Muslims who have a dispute want to go to a local imam, and agree to follow the resolution prescribed by the imam, that's their business. If a woman who is Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Wiccan, chooses to obey her husband as the head of the household, no politically correct feminist can force her to "be free." But if he beats her, she can file a criminal complaint.
It is interesting that the most widely publicized honor killing in the USA was committed by a Palestinian father and a Brazilian Roman Catholic mother -- they have honor killing in Brazil too, or did until fairly recently.
Is Frank Gaffney from Orange County, California? Here in California we call “living behind the Orange Curtain” when you live in Orange County, California because they always come out with very funny and outrageous conspiracy theories. Did you know that the self proclaim queen of the Birther movement Orly Taitz lives in Orange County, California. Orly Taitz is a lawyer, dentist, realtor and black belt, WOW I must say a JACK of all trades master of none.
ReplyDelete